The MacPlatonic Solids: Mathematics in Neolithic Scotland - Tony Mann

The story of the unexplained neolithic objects common to Northern Scotland that echo the Platonic solids, a cornerstone of Greek mathematical thinking.

Introduction to Early Mathematics - Professor Robin Wilson

From Egypt to China and back via India to Greece: a quick tour of ancient mathematics and some of the problems they were interested in.

To Infinity and Beyond - Professor Ian Morison

An overview of the development of cosmology over the last 100 years, from the Big Bang models to the discovery of Dark Energy.

The Book Of Universes - Professor John Barrow

A lecture about universes: theories, realities and possibilities, from Newton to Einstein and beyond.

Doing Business In Interstellar Space - Professor John Barrow

What do the discoveries of Einstein tell us about what life would be like if travel at the speed of light were possible?

Hubble's Heritage - Professor Ian Morison

A lecture on the legacy of both Edwin Hubble and the Space Telescope that bears his name.

Benford's Very Strange Law - Professor John D Barrow

How random can any three randomly chosen numbers be?

The Violent Universe - Professor Ian Morison

A look at the most violent events that occur in our Universe, from supernovae to the Big Bang.

The Uses of Irrationality: Paper Sizes and the Golden Ratio - Professor John D. Barrow

Random or design? The unexpectedly fascinating maths behind paper sizes.

Unsolved Mysteries of the Universe - Professor Ian Morison

A lecture on some of the great unknowns of the universe and how we are looking to answer them.

The Bounce of the Superball - Professor John D Barrow

What can we learn from a hard rough rubber ball? – Professor Barrow explains all.

Voyages to the Outer Solar System - Professor Ian Morison

A report on the discoveries of the modern unmanned missions into unseen parts of the universe: from wonderful views of the most beautiful planets to the sight of a world that is surprisingly like our Earth, but at -180° Celcius!

Continued Fractions - Professor John D Barrow

From chaos to the stars: what are continued fractions and what are they good for?

Triangular Relationships - Dr Patricia Fara

A lecture on a curious point in the history of British mathematics (and poetry!).

Black Holes: No need to be afraid! - Professor Ian Morison

What are black holes, how do we discover them, and should we be worried?

Maths with Pictures - Professor John D Barrow

A history of the many interesting and amazing ways in which pictures have been used in mathematics.

The Royal Society: An Even Shorter History of Nearly Everything - Bill Bryson

Bill Bryson speaks about the history of The Royal Society, in the process giving a short history of science.

Indra's Pearls: Geometry and Symmetry - Professor Caroline Series

The mathematics behind fractal images: what are they, who discovered them, what mathematics creates them, what are the results?

Maths and Sport - Professor John D Barrow

Maths can tell us unexpected things about sporting movement and performance. We look at some of the things that we can learn about running, jumping, throwing, swimming and systems of point-scoring by using simple maths and mechanics. Whether you are a coach, a competitor, or just a spectator, maths can enrich your sporting experience!

Life on Mars? - Professor Ian Morison

The story of how we are looking for life on Mars, and what our chances are of finding it.

Trains and Boats and Planes - Professor John D Barrow

Using maths to understand how efficient different forms of transport are.

Wonders of the Southern Skies - Professor Ian Morison

Some of the most beautiful parts of the heavens are hidden from us here in the United Kingdom. The lecture will take us on a visual journey to the most beautiful and interesting objects of the southern skies including a star that could explode any time, a cluster containing 'singing' stars, the heart of our own galaxy and our nearest galactic neighbours.

Codebreaking in Everyday Life - Professor John D Barrow

The mathematics behind the codes we meet in everyday life: product-codes, bank notes and air tickets. What are they for and what do they mean? We take a look at the mathematical structure of these codes and explain their purposes.

Impact! - Professor Ian Morison

There is simple evidence that, even in recent times, the Earth has suffered major impacts from asteroids and comets. What dangers do they hold for our civilisation? Major efforts now being made to detect those that might harm us and strategies are being developed to prevent their impacts. But we do have a problem with comets...

Composing With Numbers - Professor Jonathan Cross

The mathematics in 20th and 21st century composition: from Schoenberg to Xenakis and beyond.

The Geometry of Music - Wilfrid Hodges

The underlying mathematical structure of music as tranforming shapes.

400 Years of the Telescope - Professor Ian Morison

The telescope since Galileo: the developments, and the new discoveries that they enabled.

The Maths of Sorting Things Out - Professor John D Barrow

The everyday maths of packing boxes, boarding planes and giving change.

Mathematics, Motion, and Truth: The Earth goes round the Sun - Jeremy Gray

What is involved in accepting as true that the Earth goes round the Sun? The mathematical and scientific history of the discovery of planetary motion, from Copernicus to Poincaré.

Brilliant-Cut Diamonds and Other Tricks of the Light - Professor John Barrow

The maths of refraction, reflection and dispersion of light: the cutting of diamonds, magic illusions, and why your right hand becomes your left hand when seen in the mirror but your face is not turned upside down.

The Search for Planet X - Professor Ian Morison

The lecture will describe the nearly 200-year-long detective story of the search for planets in the outer reaches of the Solar System. It led first to the discovery of Neptune and Pluto and, recently, to Pluto's downgrading to a 'Dwarf Planet'. We already know of a second dwarf planet beyond Pluto; what others might there be?

Arctic Ocean State Changes: National interests and common interests - Dr Paul Berkman

Government solutions for the Arctic Ocean involve the integration of science diplomacy tools (notably ecosystem-based management) with recognition of international space and common interests for the lasting benefit of all humankind.

A Sense of Balance - Professor John Barrow

Why do tightrope walkers always carry long poles? What is the difference between weight and inertia? We take a look at balance and stability, from gymnastics and spinning racquets to the rescue of the International Space Station set spinning by a potentially disastrous collision with its docking vehicle.

Avoiding Death by Computer - Professor Harold Thimbleby

One of the reasons why people make mistakes is that the systems they use are badly designed, and this is perhaps nowhere more alarming than in hospital errors involving drug delivery systems. This talk reviews a well-documented, but otherwise typical, fatality and shows that many causes could be prevented by better design, and better programming in particular.

How we reached the Moon: Mankind's incredible achievement - Jerry Stone

A look at the story of the moon landing, now 40 years ago.

100 Essential Things You Didn't Know You Didn't Know - Professor John D Barrow

Some of the unexpected applications of mathematics: from winning the lottery to divorce settlements.

Mathematics and smallpox - Professor Tom Körner

Bernoulli’s statistics, weighing the risks and benefits of inoculation against smallpox.

It's about time - Professor Ian Morison

Time is one of the most mysterious concepts in our Universe. It is easy to describe how we define its passage and how we can make exceedingly accurate clocks but questions as to what determines the arrow of time and whether time travel is possible can tax the most brilliant minds!

How to be a Winner: The maths of race fixing and money laundering - Professor John D Barrow

How does maths shed light on the fixing of horse races? What is the secret mathematics underlying money-laundering? How can you ensure a game is fair even though the gaming device is not?

Harbingers of Doom? - Professor Ian Morison

Though a beautiful sight in our heavens, comets were once thought to be evil vapours burning up in our atmosphere. However, we now know that they have brought organic material and water to our planet Earth so helping to lay the foundations of life. But, equally, one could bring about the end of civilisation!

Some Interesting Curves - Professor John D Barrow

Hanging chains and shapes of suspension bridges. - Why is the Eiffel Tower shaped like it is? Why do the wind turbines have an odd number of propeller arms? Why is it hard to build a roller coaster that doesn't subject the rider to lethal g-forces?

The Search for Other Worlds - Professor Ian Morison

One of the hottest topics in astronomy is that of detecting other solar systems. The methods by which this has been achieved so far have yet to detect an earth-like planet, but already a miniature version of our solar system has been discovered. How do these discoveries affect the prospects for life elsewhere?

The maths of pylon, art galleries and prisons under the spotlight - Professor John D Barrow

Some mathematics of straight lines: Why are electricity pylons made of triangular patterns of struts?, What is the smallest number of attendants you need to watch an art gallery of any shape and any number of rooms? What is the smallest number of cameras you need to watch the outside walls of a prison?

Harmonic things - Professor John D Barrow

The difference between series that are finite and infinite and the ubiquity of the harmonic series: going to infinity very slowly, the Problem of the Pile of Books, winning streaks in sports events, how to tell a real random sequence from a faked one, and much more!

God and the Universe - Professor Ian Morison

With scientific knowledge ever-progressing, is there space left for God? Is there going to be a time when science will have uncovered all the secrets of the universe and proven that there is no Divinity?

Mathematics and the Medici: Instruments from Late Renaissance Florence - Jim Bennett

The 16th-century instruments in the Museum of the History of Science in Florence provide one of the most attractive records of contemporary mathematics, significant for having been formed in the period, rather than assembled later by a museum or a collector. This lecture presents the results of cataloguing these instruments.

The Invisible Universe - Professor Ian Morison

We believe that 96% of the mass and energy content of our Universe is invisible. Some is in the form of Dark Matter whose presence we can only detect by its gravitational influence. The majority, called Dark Energy, appears to be ripping our Universe apart.

The importance of being peripheral - Professor John D Barrow

The maths of surfaces and boundaries: Queen Dido's problem, the shapes and huddles of herds, tactics of Atlantic convoys, Shoals of fish, swarms of midges, and much more.

Now the dust has settled: A view of Robert Hooke post-2003 - Professor Michael Cooper

The tercentenary in 2003 of Hooke's death saw a flurry of publications, media interest and discussions related to his life and work. Have those events changed our understanding of Hooke? If so, how and why? Some answers are proposed.

Our 'Island Universe' - Professor Ian Morison

A lecture in which we will learn how the size and spiral structure of our own Milky Way has been determined, how it relates to others within our local group of galaxies and how the gravitational pull of groups and clusters has determined the large scale structure of the Universe.

Not just about numbers - Professor John D Barrow

What is mathematics and why does it 'work'? A look at the way mathematics can tell you things about the world that you cannot learn any other way: from the simple nature of many 'hard' problems and how to win at dice to modern concepts of chaos and whether the Premier Football League is just a random process.

Ageing Stars - Professor Ian Morison

The latter days in the lives of stars are by far the most interesting; they synthesise the elements from which planets like our Earth are formed, and die in cataclysmic explosions to form Planetary Nebulae, White Dwarfs, Neutron Stars and Black Holes.

Lewis Carroll in Numberland - Professor Robin Wilson

A lecture to celebrate of one of the nineteenth century's most gifted minds, whose writings have inspired and entertained generations of readers. Yet only now are the less well-known mathematical achievements of Charles Lutwidge Dodgson (better known as Lewis Carroll) finally brought to light.

400 years of geometry at Gresham College - Professor Robin Wilson

Henry Briggs (1561 - 1631), first Gresham Professor of Geometry, returns to tell the story of the College's early days, and surveys the history of the Geometry Chair over the succeeding 400 years.

Giant Waves on the Open Sea: Mariners' tall tales or alarming fact? - Professor Paul H Taylor

On 1 January 1995 a sensor on a platform in the central North Sea recorded a giant 60ft high wave crest - giant waves are not just the tales of sailors. What physics drives such waves? How common are they? How hould engineers design structures to survive rare but potentially catastrophic events?

Cancer can give you Maths! - Professor Philip Maini

Verbal reasoning alone cannot be used to understand the outcome of the complex interactions that typically comprise biological function, so more and more researchers are turning to mathematical and computational modelling to gain insights on experimental results. Some approaches and advances will be illustrated concerning understanding the basic dynamics of solid tumour growth.

Cosmic Imagery: Key Images in the History of Science - Professor John D Barrow

A survey of some of the most iconic and influential images from the history of science: from the world's first graph through to the first pictures of earth taken from space.

The Search for Extra-Terrestial Intelligence in the New Millennium - Professor Ian Morison

An overview of our attempts to detect the presence of other advanced civilisations, an explanation of why we should not be too disheartened by our failure so far and an explanation of how a giant radio telescope, due for completion in 2020, would give us a realistic chance of searching the whole Galaxy.

From Hilbert's problems to the future - Professor Robin Wilson

In 1900 the German mathematician David Hilbert presented the mathematical community with 23 unsolved problems. What were they, and how successful were attempts to solve them? 100 years later the mathematical world was presented with seven 'millennium problems'. What are they, and where is maths heading in the future?

Proving Einstein right! - Professor Ian Morison

A gentle introduction to Einstein's General Theory of Relativity discussing gravitational waves and the curvature of space and how, since 1915, experiments have been undertaken to test its accuracy. Recent observations by Jodrell Bank astronomers have shown that Einstein's theory must be at least 99.95% right!

Beauty in the Heavens - Professor Ian Morison

Three of the most beautiful sights that we can observe in the sky are the Aurora Borealis and eclipses of the Sun and Moon. This lecture explains how such phenomena arise, describes what we can see and gives details of upcoming eclipses.

A millennium of mathematical puzzles - Professor Robin Wilson

In the 8th century Alcuin of York described the wolf, goat and cabbage problem - so did Lewis Carroll over 1000 years later. This lecture looks at a wide variety of mathematical puzzles that entertained people of all ages over the intervening period.

Squaring the circle and other impossibilities - Professor Robin Wilson

The problem of how to "square the circle" fascinated mathematicians for over 2000 years since Ancient Greece through to its solution in the 19th century. What was the problem, what methods were tried for tackling it, and how was they eventually solved?